markers

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Comrade Cochranovski -

In the end years of markers on the 'W, two of the openings were large (5 3/8" as I recall,) and two were a little smaller.

The scheme for colored lenses in markers was this: One Large Red, One Large Amber, Two Small Ambers. The Large Red and the Large Amber were on opposite sizes of the lamp body from one another.

You can find all these lenses on Ebay.

Markers could be rotated while still in their mounting bracket on the side of the caboose or passenger car. On the under-side of the sheet metal market housing is a thumb-latch release. If the thumb-latch release is depressed and held in, the marker body can be rotated 360 degrees (i.e. full circle) in its mounting bracket.

If you are a carrier of either the Bean Counter Gene or the Nerd Gene, the history of the colors displayed on railroad signals and in railroad lamps in interesting for all its permutations. The changes center around the inability of the glass houses (i.e. manufacturers like Corning and Kopp) to produce a Yellow glass which could satisfy railroads for uniformity of color from batch to batch, and transmissibility (ability to pass the light generated by the flame.) The break-through came in 1913 (as I recall,) when the glass houses came out with good yellow glass. This enabled the railroads to shift from White/Green/Red for signaling, to Green/Yellow/Red for signaling. And lenses used in lamps and lanterns were likewise re-jiggered in the same era.

And yes, the N&W used Green in its caboose markers at one time, and Green flags on the rear ends of trains, too ! (Green was originally the color for Danger.) Look at the illustrations in old Rule Books and the logic of the system will be quite transparent.

-- abramo burnettovitz
Turnipolysis = the Metabolization of Distilled Turnip Juice
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We Happily Promote Canals, Steam Navigation, Railroads, Telegraph,
the American Indian, Motherhood, the Luminiferous Æther
... and Turnips.
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